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BushCrimeFamily

The White House announced yesterday the troubled website for logging onto Obamacare would be fixed by the end of November. What went wrong? The contractors who designed it are busy blaming each other (when they’re not blaming the government). Meanwhile, the National Security Agency’s contractors aren’t doing much better. Those now building the NSA’s huge Utah Data Center are plagued by electrical failures. The NSA contractor (Booz Allen Hamilton) that hired Edward Snowden failed to uncover Snowden's past security violations at the CIA. And we all remember Halliburton. (cont.)

BushCrimeFamily

(cont.) While federal government employment keeps shrinking (the government has fewer employees today than it’s had since 1966), contractors are doing ever more. According to the Washington Post, close to 30 percent of the workforce in the intelligence agencies is now contracted out, as is a growing portion of military operations, information technology, research, and large projects like the Obamacare website. It’s been a bonanza for private, for-profit contractors along with their armies of lobbyists and consultants. But as the mounting scandals reveal, the privatization of government has not been particularly good for the public. Contractors are blissfully unaccountable to anyone – except their shareholders. - Robert Reich

WVUGEO

We went here - if you read the full opinion piece - from a rant against Obamacare to a cry of alarm about what Obama's EPA is doing to the Coal industry. Well. if we want to win the War On Coal, then we need real weapons to get it done. Shrill cries about the horror of it all, as herein, are a wasted breaking of wind. The facts are these: Coal itself can be converted into Gasoline and Diesel, as they are doing quite successfully in China and South Africa. Carbon Dioxide can be converted into fuel alcohol and substitute natural gas Methane, and into plastics, as is being done, right now, in Iceland and Germany. Coal Ash can be mined for commodity metals, as the are doing now in China, or, used as a raw material in cement and concrete. The Reagan Building, home of the EPA, is made of concrete containing a large percentage of Coal Ash.

Gooseman

Maybe Mr. Meyers can explain why the right wing extremists believe hungry children are "insignificant".

"...Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, into a target for House Republicans looking to reduce spending." "Charities cannot fill the gap for the cuts being proposed to SNAP," said Maura Daly of Feeding America, a network of the nation's food banks. "We are very concerned about the impact on the charitable system." "Daly says food banks may have to as much as double their current levels of distribution if the House cuts were enacted. The Congressional Budget Office says as many as 3.8 million people could lose their benefits in 2014 if the House bill became law."

RockEReputation

WHile Health Affairs reports that a mere 17% of the 15 million individual health insurance policy buyers even sign up for the same plan for two consecutive years

..and while many of the bargain basement health care policies shouldn't even be called insurance coverage, as they only offer paying subscribers guaranteed financial ruin should a major health issue develop

..and while many insurers have decided to drop plans due to the fact that their coverage doesn't meet the ACA policy requirements, including the stip that they must spend 80% of subscriber premiums on actual medical care thereby reducing their admin fees and profits

Democrats really didn't set out to enact this Heritage Foundation alternative to single payer that Mitt signed into law in MA.

RockEReputation

Only if Obamacare is a precursor to single-payer, as insurance companies buck-and-moan and flounder due to decreased medical loss profit ratios, only then can US citizen health care indemnity ever be in line with the rest of the industrialized world, enabling us to get our national account balanced.

WVUGEO

Again, the author went to a cry of alarm about what Obama's EPA is doing to the Coal industry because of, among other things, CO2. Everyone needs to know that Saudi Arabia has established technology, some of it already granted US patents, that converts CO2 into, basically, synthetic petroleum. One of their granted US patents is: "8,288,446 - Catalytic Hydrogenation of CO2 into Syngas Mixture; 2012; Saudi Basic Industries Corporation, Riyadh; Abstract: The invention relates to a process of making a syngas mixture ... comprising a step of contacting ... carbon dioxide and hydrogen with a catalyst (which) enables hydrogenation of carbon dioxide (and can) be combined with other processes ... for making products like ... ethane, propane and iso-butane; ... or alcohols such as methanol". The "methanol", can be converted directly into Gasoline via ExxonMobil's "MTG"(r), methanol-to-gasoline, process. And, we're closing Coal-fired power plants because of CO2 emis

WVUGEO

WVEXPAT

Goose, From the same article you cited, "According to the Agriculture Department, that means a family of four receiving food stamps will receive $36 less a month."

That's $0.30 a day per person less! We have the wealthiest, most obese "poor" people in the world! I'm sure there are truly hungry children and they should be helped, but we are $17 Trillion in debt! We are paying $250 billion in interest payments alone (with no plan to pay down the principle) so which is more extreme?

Gooseman

One of the tax breaks upon which President Obama has focused is a provision that allows hedge fund managers — who make billions annually — to receive a substantial tax break. This particular tax break, known as the carried-interest loophole, allows hedge fund managers to treat the money they receive from investors as capital gains, subject to a 15 percent tax rate. Though this money is a paycheck received for services, just like a movie star receiving a bonus if her movie does well, it’s treated as investment income.

Since hedge fund managers are some of the richest people in the country, this tax break actually causes a significant loss of revenue. In fact, according to calculation by RJ Eskow, closing this loophole would raise more than $4 billion per year just from the 25 richest hedge fund managers.

Gooseman

In fact, according to calculation by RJ Eskow, closing this loophole would raise more than $4 billion per year just from the 25 richest hedge fund managers:

The top 25 hedge fund managers in the United States collectively earned $22 billion last year, and yet they have their own cushy set of tax rules. If they operated under the same rules that apply to other people — police officers, for example, or teachers — the country could cut its national deficit by as much as $44 billion in the next ten years."

richardwhee

The U.S. has the fattest, obese people in the world. Why do they always bxxxxh that they are not getting enough food stamps? Wake up America and tighten the purse strings more. Sound cruel?? Yes, but have them look in the mirror. Suggestion- Sell clothes by increasing price-by size.

RockEReputation

Synopsis-SIZING" the mess. It's 2003. Bush sees approach of the greatest deficit in US history at $475 billion for 2004 BUT election's coming (let's buy senior votes with Med. Part D)!!

It failed the House vote, so vote kept open three more hours, bribes, (Tom DeLay busted by the House Ethics Committee) Part D PASSED.

..and so we got a fiscally SOUND Medicare PART D with NO dedicated financing, NO revenue raisers, NO offsets…with 100% added to deficit….and WITH Democrats rallying to assist in ironing out its many wrinkles and flaws, did we not?

BushCrimeFamily

Reince Priebus, chairman of the Republican National Committee, writes in a new email that “Barack Obama knowingly and repeatedly lied to Americans.” Priebus and other Republicans are piling on the President for saying about the Affordable Care Act that “if you like your insurance plan you can keep it,” in light of millions of Americans in the private-insurance market (covering about 5 percent of us) now seeing their rates soar or policies cancelled. What Priebus and other Republicans don’t say is that even before the Act went into effect, individual insurance plans typically had to be renewed annually, many were cancelled without warning, and year-to-year rates were already soaring. (cont.)

BushCrimeFamily

(cont.) The Act allows insurers to continue offering their old plans, but many insurers are choosing not to. In other words, the Act isn’t the culprit; the insurers are. Obama is being skewered for failing to warn Americans what they should already have known: that the market for private insurance is totally unreliable. Which is why we needed the Affordable Care Act in the first place (and why it would have been even better as a single-payer add-on to Medicare and Social Security). -- Robert Reich

TrollSlayer

TrollSlayer

Barry Obribery, lying to the American people: “That means that no matter how we reform health care, we will keep this promise to the American people: If you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor, period. If you like your health-care plan, you’ll be able to keep your health-care plan, period. No one will take it away, no matter what.”

Over and over. Lie after lie after lie. Period. Own it, Dems.

The media doesn’t even have to cover this Obama lie. Americans losing their health insurance, and seeing their rates skyrocket, heard those promises, now know they were lies, and will know who to blame, Dems.

oldmansvan

1whoworks

Quote Robert Rech? Now that is a reliable source. I choose to believe what happens to me and what I see happening to my friends and family. Fact. All of the 20-40 year olds I know don't want to sign up and will pay the penalty. All of the older people on Medicare etc. will sign up because they must. But will not pay into the plan. Welfare freeloaders will and are, according to the stats they will release, sign up and gobble up more from the government trough. Those of us who work will be taxed more to pay for them. The economy will continue to stink and get worse. Yawn - Jimmy Carter must be proud. Finally someone can screw things up worse than he did!

SpankysLastDance

I guess if you want to know how we got to this point with the government mandating health insurance, you would have to wikipedia it. Might be surprised to learn how Republicans Chaffe and Hatch and a few others played a part in what we now have. Moral of the story here is you can't believe everything you hear. Both parties are responsible. Time to get them out, start shrinking the government and setting term limits!